Джеффри Дивер - The Cutting Edge

Okay, if not the safe, then what?

As the medical examiner techs removed the bodies — the couple first and then Patel — she gazed over the three rooms once more.

What if, Sachs speculated, it wasn’t a robbery at all, but a hit? Had Patel borrowed money from a loan shark and failed to pay it back? Not likely — he owned a successful business and hardly seemed like the kind of man to contact a local gangbanger for a loan at 30 percent vig, the going rate for interest on street borrowing, and that was per month .

A romance gone bad? Patel was a widower, she’d learned. And the round, unkempt middle-aged man just didn’t seem like the type to become embroiled in a torrid and dangerous affair. If simply killing him was the motive, why the torture? And, for that matter, why break into the shop? Why not just tap him at home or on the street?

Her eyes returned to the workroom. Had Patel or an employee been working on a diamond or piece of jewelry that was particularly valuable?

She walked into the room. The workstations didn’t appear to have been used today; all the equipment was arranged neatly on shelves or racks. However, at one station she noticed another of those sheets of paper folded into an envelope for holding diamonds, like those in the safe. This one, however, was empty. Written on it in pen were: GC-1, GC-2, GC-3 and GC-4. The names for the diamonds it had contained, she guessed, since weight in carats was given next to each (they ranged from five to seven point five). There were letters beside each, as well. The designation D, IF was next to three. Beside the last one, smaller, was D, F. Quality ranking, maybe. Also on the sheet was written: Owner: Grace-Cabot Mining, Ltd., Cape Town, South Africa. Beside that was the company’s phone number.

“Hm,” she muttered aloud when she saw another note, at the bottom. This stated the valuation of each stone. The total worth was sixty-eight million ZAR. She pulled out her phone and Googled, learning that the denomination was, not surprisingly, South African rands.

What was surprising was the number she came up with when she ran the currency conversion calculator.

The value in U.S. dollars hovered around five million

Amelia Sachs believed she had found a pretty likely answer to Question Number One.

To confirm that the pricey diamonds were indeed what had been stolen, Amelia Sachs returned to the safe and looked at every one of the hundreds of small folded squares.

No envelopes were marked with the letters GC or the company name. A call to Grace-Cabot would confirm that Patel had been in possession of the stones but it was a reasonable assumption that these were what the unsub had taken.

Had he known the gems were here? Or had he simply picked Patel’s operation at random and demanded to know where the most valuable stones were?

Only speculation at this point.

Sachs photographed the Grace-Cabot box and receipt, then bagged them.

Now, Question Two: the torture.

Sachs disagreed with Sellitto that Patel had been tortured to give up the combination of the safe or tell where valuable diamonds, like the Grace-Cabot stones, were. In the end, the diamonds were just a commodity. Faced with death, or even the threat of torture, Patel would have given up any or all of his wares. Everything would be insured. No bit of jewelry was worth your life or one second of pain.

No, the unsub was after something else. What?

To find an answer Amelia Sachs did what she often was forced to do at scenes, as harrowing as the process might be: She mentally, emotionally, became the perp. In an instant she was no longer a cop, no longer a woman. She was the man who had created this carnage.

And asking herself — himself : Why do I need to hurt him?

Need is the word. I’m feeling an urgency. A desperation.

Why do I have to hurt him and make him talk?

A prickly sensation around her face again, around the base of her neck, above her spine. This wasn’t the heat from the stifling air, which she’d felt earlier. And it wasn’t the horror she was feeling at the Method Acting role she was playing. No, the symptoms were from the edginess coursing through his body.

Something’s not right. I need to fix it. What, what, what?

Go back in time, think, imagine, picture...

Just after noon, I’m entering the shop. Yes, entering the office behind the couple, William and Anna. These lovers are my entrée through security and they’re going to die because they’ve seen my face. I feel relief at this thought: their death. It’s comforting. No loose ends.

When they push through the door, I move in behind them.

I can’t control both of them with the knife. No, I’ll have that firearm out. But I’m reluctant to use it because of the noise.

Still, I will if I have to, and they know it.

William and Anna and Patel don’t move.

They settle.

I settle.

I’m in control.

Good, I’m feeling good now.

I hit Patel — with the weapon, probably. Incapacitate him. The couple gets tied up. They’re crying, both of them. Moving close to each other, to feel the other’s presence. Because they know what’s coming.

I’m not moved by this, not at all.

This thought took her back to herself and her breath grew fast, her teeth ground together, her gut tightened. She dug one gloved index fingernail against a gloved thumb. Felt the pain. Ignored it.

Back. Get back inside him.

And she did.

Now I’m crouching, grabbing the hair of the man and slicing his neck.

Then the woman’s.

I hear Patel’s cries. But I pay them no mind as I watch the couple thrash and bleed to death. One task done. That’s what I think. A task. Done. Good. Tick one thing off the list. That’s all the deaths are. A checkmark.

I turn to Patel. He’s down, he’s no threat. And he’s terrified. I ask him for the most valuable stones he’s got.

He tells me. He gives the combination to the safe and I get the Grace-Cabot diamonds. But — here’s the key. Important. Vital. I want something else , something he’s not giving up.

What?

Now, bending down, I’m cutting differently, cutting to hurt, cutting to let information spill from him, along with the blood. It’s satisfying. Again. Another cut. Face and ear and finger.

Then, finally, he tells me.

I relax. The knife finds his throat. Three fast slices.

It’s over.

What has Patel told me?

What has he given me?

What am I so desperate to find? What do I so need to find?

I have my treasures, five million worth of stones. Why not just leave?

Then she understood.

The one thing I need is to protect myself. I’m obsessed with my own preservation. That’s what I could torture someone for. To learn the identity of somebody who’s a threat to me. I spray-paint one security camera, I steal the hard drive of the camera I can’t paint, I kill two innocent witnesses solely because they’ve seen my face...

I need to make sure no other witnesses will say anything to the police.

There was the man who walked into the robbery, the man I shot, and who called 911 to report the attack. Would I torture Patel to get his name? He didn’t see much. Just me in a ski mask, he’d reported. And he probably walked in after Patel was dead. Not much of a threat there. No, more likely I’d have tortured the diamond cutter to find the name of somebody else who might have seen my actual face.

Yes, that could be reason enough to torture.

Stepping out of character, Sachs lowered her head and slumped against the wall, breathing hard and wiping sweat from her eyes and temples. When she’d recovered from the dark channeling, she returned to the hallway and browsed through the evidence. She located Patel’s calendar and looked through it. The entries indicated that “S” would be here at 11 a.m., “W and A” — William and Anna, the murdered couple — at 11:45. “VL” was written in the margin on Saturday, not next to any particular time. VL was likely the answer to Question Number Three — who had called 911. A partial answer only, though, as initials were not an identification.